Camp would be respite from mom's illness

May 27, 2011

Updated Aug. 21, 2013 12:28 p.m.

1 of 6

The Johnson quadruplets, left to right, Alex, Mimi, Emma and Ryan, pose at their home in Fountain Valley. They help their dad take care of their mom, who has breast cancer. ANA P. GUTIERREZ, FOR THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

1 of 6

10-year-old quadruplets (left to right) Emma, Mimi, Alex and Ryan Johnson and their father Daniel sit with their mother, Martha, as she rests at their home in Fountain Valley. Martha Johnson is battling stage 3 triple-negative inflammatory breast cancer. ANA P. GUTIERREZ, FOR THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

1 of 6

10-year-old quadruplets (left to right) Emma, Mimi, Alex and Ryan Johnson and their father Daniel sit with their mother, Martha as she rests at their home in Fountain Valley. Martha Johnson is battling stage 3 triple-negative inflammatory breast cancer. ANA P. GUTIERREZ, FOR THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

1 of 6

The Johnson quadruples (left to right), Alex, Ryan, Emma and Mimi, pose at their home in Fountain Valley. They look forward to attending summer camp. ANA P. GUTIERREZ, FOR THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

1 of 6

Alex, Ryan, Emma and Mimi Johnson (left to right) pose at their home in Fountain Valley. ANA P. GUTIERREZ, FOR THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

The Johnson quadruplets, left to right, Alex, Mimi, Emma and Ryan, pose at their home in Fountain Valley. They help their dad take care of their mom, who has breast cancer. ANA P. GUTIERREZ, FOR THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

2011 Register Campership Fund

100 percent of campaign donations send children of low-income families to camp. The donations are distributed to the following agencies:

Visit OC Moms for parenting columns, family-friendly event info, giveaways and more just for you.

Martha Johnson lies in bed, eyes closed against the pain of the cancer, an oxygen machine humming in the corner. Her four children – her "miracle quads" – help take care of her now.

They remember when she used to take them on long walks and pick apples with them, and they still laugh about her impersonations of the masked movie wrestler Nacho Libre. They woke up early on Mother's Day, tip-toed into the kitchen, and whipped up some waffles – gluten-free and sugar-free so she could still eat them.

There are four of them, fraternal quadruplets, Mimi and Emma, Alex and Ryan. They're 10 years old and, while they're stoic enough not to tell anyone at school what their mom is going through, they're still kids. They play at the beach. They practice karate. And they go to camp.

"The routine enables them to have a distraction," said their father, Daniel Nicherie, who had his own scare recently with a cancerous cyst in his brain. "They can celebrate life, celebrate the summer."

From her bed, their mother added: "They know a lot. They get scared that when they come home from school, I'm not going to be around."

They've been a team throughout, but their personalities are as different as their aspirations. Ryan is a talker, a future businessman with a big heart; Emma is the mediator but also the artist, who draws her mom's favorite, cartoon character Pepe' Le Pew. Alex is the quiet type, a long-distance runner and a video gamer; and Mimi hopes to one day be a singer, or a teacher, or a lawyer, or a vet.

They were 8 years old in 2008 when their mother came home from a doctor's appointment and told them she was sick. An ultrasound had found what regular mammograms had missed, Daniel said: three beads of cancer in her left breast. She was 48 years old.

Doctors call it triple-negative inflammatory breast cancer, a rare and vicious form that attacked her skin and then spread to her lymph nodes and arm. The family went on the move, chasing treatments as far away as New York before settling with Martha's sister and her family in a cramped house in Fountain Valley.

Martha had been a zookeeper and worked with Galapagos tortoises at the San Diego Zoo, her family says. Old photos show her in short shorts and blond curls, smiling at the camera. But for the past three months, the pain from the cancer has kept her in bed, in a room filled with pill bottles.

"She was really pretty and funny," Emma says. "It makes me sad when I go (see her). When I talk to her, it seems like she's hurting a lot. I don't like to see her like that."

"It's really scary," Ryan agreed. "I like to check up on her, see if she's OK. I'm not sure if she gets worse or better every day."

Their parents have made it a point to keep them in the routines of 10-year-old kids. Their father hustles them to karate practice every Saturday, and takes them to play at the Boys & Girls Club. That's why summer camp is so important, he says. But that's not how they see it.

They're just looking forward to swimming in the lake, going backpacking, sitting around the campfire. They rattle off the childhood joys of previous camps – zip lines and carnivals, bunking out in the wilderness and eating cupcakes.

Their parents call them the Miracle Quads, a title they borrowed for a Facebook page they created to raise money for their mother's treatment. "They are," their father says. "Everything about them is a miracle."

Related Links

User Agreement

Keep it civil and stay on topic. No profanity, vulgarity, racial
slurs or personal attacks. People who harass others or joke about
tragedies will be blocked. By posting your comment, you agree to
allow Orange County Register Communications, Inc. the right to
republish your name and comment in additional Register publications
without any notification or payment.